Folk hero

A folk hero is a figure, real or legendary, whose deeds have imprinted themselves upon the popular consciousness, historically through folklore, tales and songs, but in modern times increasingly via the printed word and broadcast media.

Often outlaws or anti-establishment figures, and so with their acts largely absent from any surviving official documents of their periods, for many folk heroes even the certainty of their existence is unclear. Even for those known to have had real existence, their legendary acts often have little or no foundation in reality, with what few hard facts that were known of them having been repeatedly embellished by balladeers and chroniclers. The distinction between a folk hero and a mythological figure is not clearly defined, and is partly one of distance - in time, the stories told about today's folk heroes may grow to resemble myths about Greek or Norse heroes and gods.